Misfit
by Gina Trujillo
Summary: And everyone thought it was bad that one time some elf got it in his head that he wanted to be a dentist... Such things are mild by comparison to the situation that Bouncy Jingles Jr. is in.


I realize that this looks like the start of a longer story. I want to note right away that this is probably a one-shot. I don't plan on making a sequel or adding on other chapters at all. This is all that stands for the time being, although I really have to admit that I'm loving the main character. It was just randomness that I came up with the other day and decided to write for the sake of just writing SOMETHING other than a school paper. When you're dealing with writer's block, you take what you get, no?

On another note, PLEASE DO NOT COMMENT ON THIS FIC ASKING ME TO UPDATE ANY OTHER FICS! I'm working on another chapter of "The Making of the Pumpkin King" and it will be up when I can manage it. But I do thank you for all the support!

As always, please be honest in reviewing. Love it, hate it, tell me. Thanks.

Without further ado, I bring you… ah, crud, what was I gonna call it…? Nightmare after Christmas? Ew, no, lame. Ah, well. We'll go with….

"Misfit" By Gina Trujillo

Snowflakes danced in the air as they blew down from the tops of the houses and evergreen trees. Children ran about making having snowball fights and building forts. Their laughter rang like silver bells through the street. Doctor Ivy Tinsel sat in her office, sipping at a mug of hot cocoa topped with marshmallow as she watched the scene outside her window. She crossed her shapely little green-stocking adorned legs, the jingle bells on her toes making a gentile clamor as she moved. A sweet smile on her ruby lips, she glanced to the candy-cane colored clock. Her newest patient was late for his first appointment, but she could forgive that. It was nearing Christmas, and most every elf in the Christmas Town was as busy as could be with preparations.

As if on cue, there came a knock at the office door. Ivy hurried to answer it, greeting the elf on the other side with a warm smile. Standing before her was a young man, clad in garments of the deepest, darkest shades of red that Ivy had ever laid eyes on. His shoulders were slumped, hands deep within the pockets of his pants. His dark eyes lifted from the floor to meet her gaze, and Ivy felt her smile melt away, no matter how she tried to keep it. He was very young to be coming to her. Most elves waited until they were at least twice as old before coming down with a crisis.

"You're Doctor Tinsel?" The man asked flatly.

"Yes, I am," Ivy chirped as she found where her jolly spirit had slipped off to for the moment, "You must be Bouncy Jingles Jr. Do come in!" She stepped aside to allow him to enter.

The elf grimaced, "Call me Jing, please," he muttered as his eyes played over the room.

"Alright, Jing," Ivy replied in a chipper manner. She motioned to a couch that sat near the Christmas tree, "Go ahead and make yourself comfortable. Would you like some cocoa?"

"No, thank you," Jing replied flatly as he unwound his dark red scarf from about his neck, "I don't really like cocoa."

Ivy thought this was odd. Everyone likes cocoa, she thought. She said nothing, however, as this young man was there for her help, because he had some quirk or another that needed ironing out, and she was just the lady to do it. Settling into her large fluffy chair, she took a white writing quill in hand and looked over her papers in her notepad. She absently hummed a few line of _Deck the Halls_ to herself as she did so.

"Can you not do that?" Jing chimed in, "Just… for a while. While I'm here?"

"I'm sorry, what was I doing?" Ivy asked him in a honey-coated tone.

"Humming," Jing replied with an edge of annoyance, "Can you not do it, please?"

"Oh, I'm sorry," Ivy was quick to say, "I didn't realize I was doing it. I'll try not to anymore." She folded dainty hands onto her knee, "Now, what seems to be troubling you, Jing?"

"What doesn't seem to be troubling me?" Jing muttered bitterly.

"Well, let's start with something, and we'll see where things go." Ivy replied, smiling on.

"Look, lady," Jing fixed her with a bitter stare, "I don't want to be here. My mom sent me because she thinks there's something wrong with me. Is there any chance we could arrange something? You know, you just write a letter that says I'm fine that I can give to my parents and we never have to see each other again?"

"I'm afraid I can't do that," Ivy said with the utmost of sympathy, "Nice try, though."

"I figured you'd say that," Jing sighed and slumped back on the couch, his dark clothing standing out with great contrast against the white cushions. "Alright, then, let's get this over with."

"What seems to be troubling you?" Ivy leaned closer, turning a pointed ear toward him to listen.

"I don't know, exactly," Jing muttered, "Just… things, I guess."

"Well, you did ask me to stop humming," Ivy coaxed, "Do you not like humming? Or singing?"

"No, it's not that, really," Jing replied, "I sing all the time. Well, to myself, I mean."

"So what is it that's bothering you?" the doctor tried to pull and answer out of the boy.

Jing shifted uncomfortably in his seat, eyes glancing at the window. "It's kind of complicated. I've been thinking about it for a long time, and… I know when all this started. I just don't know how to fix it… and… I don't know if I really want to fix it anyway. I don't know if there _is_ anything that really _needs_ fixing."

Ivy sat silently and listened, scribbling notes into her book. "Go ahead," she said when it appeared that Jing was going to stop, "Keep going, I'm listening."

"I… I don't really know how to say this." He sat forward, dark eyes fixing her with a serious gaze, "You have to promise me… promise, promise, promise… that you won't… you know… get weird about it."

"Get weird?" Ivy echoed, "Jing, nothing you would tell me would seem weird, honey. Go ahead."

"No, I'm serious," Jing pressed his point, "Mrs. Tinsel, I don't think you understand. The way I think, I mean, the way my mind works, it's completely different than any other elf in the world."

"There's nothing wrong with that," Dr. Tinsel assured him, "Everyone thinks differently, Jing. There's nothing wrong with you for having your own opinions, thoughts, and goals. Why, a lot of elves in the past have made history by being a misfit. You're at a difficult time in an elf's life, but there's no need to…"

"No," Jing interrupted in annoyance, "You don't get what I'm trying to tell you! I'm not talking about some teenage confusion of identity. I'm not talking about being afraid of my own individuality and wanting to fit in. I'm not dealing with some issues of feeling like my life's dream is crazy and no one will understand." He came to his feet then and moved toward the fireplace, "This isn't some stupid secret desire to become a dentist, alright? So don't hand me that crap."

Ivy blinked her green eyes in surprise, but only because Jing's back was turned to her. Her tone remained cheerful and even, "I'm sorry, but I really can't help if you don't tell me what's bothering you."

Jing sighed. It was a breath that sounded as if it had come up from the very depths of his soul to exhale all of the troubles of the universe, knowing that they would only return again. Doctor Ivy had heard sighs like this before and had helped to remedy the problems behind every one of them. She sat with great confidence as Jing began to speak his tale into the warmth of the fireplace.

"I was very little when this all started. It was only a couple of months until Christmas. Mom and dad were working late at the toy factory, so my big sister had put all of us to bed. I've got a lot of brothers, and we all shared a big cozy bed back then. I was the youngest, so I was on the end… you know, where you always end up with no covers because everyone else steals them.

"Anyway, it was on one night that I had this dream. I still remember it, clear as day. Our bedroom window slid open, and a shadow came into the room. It moved quickly across the floor, and I thought it moved under the bed on my brother's side. But I didn't move. In fact, while I watched this, I felt… well, hardly anything. It was just a dream and I was along for the ride, you know?

"Then the figure stood up, and he moved around the foot of the bed, through the darkness. His shadow came across the wall toward me first, creeping along as if it were sneaking up one me. He finally moved into the light that was cast through the window by the streetlight." Jing's voice dropped low, the words trembling, "His face… he was a skeleton, his bones bleached white as snow. He came all the way up to me at the bedside and knelt down. He leaned close to me, so close that I could feel the cold air coming off of his cloths, and he set a hand lightly on my head."

Jing knelt beside the fireplace, shivering and wanting to be closer to the flames, "And then, just as quickly as he came, he darted back across the room and out the window again. I sat up in surprise, but he was gone. I tried to tell my brothers what had just happened. They told me I was just having a nightmare and to go back to sleep. To dream about sugarplums next time. I didn't go back to sleep, though. I just sat in the bed with my knees to my chest, staring at the open window, too scared to look away until the sun came up. I knew it hadn't really been a dream. Even then, as I lied to myself, I knew it had been real. The window was open, I know I was awake when I sat up and saw him leave."

"Why, Jing," Ivy sat forward, speaking as if she had just discovered everything that was wrong, "That must have been the man who tried to steal Christmas! Jack Skellington, from the land of Hollowing!"

"Halloween," Jing corrected her with a bitter glance over his shoulder. As his eyes met her, she felt a tingle of cold shoot from her toes to her ears. "Of course it was him!" Jing snapped, "I figured that much out the moment his face was plastered all over the newspapers. Who he was isn't the point. Everybody experienced a nightmare before Christmas that year, but _my_ nightmares didn't end."

"I'm sorry," Ivy told him softly, "Please, continue. I'm listening."

"Look, I don't think this is going to work," Jing said as he came to his feet, "I'm just gonna go."

"No, please," Ivy said, standing as well. The bells on her shoes chimed a sweet little tune as she shuffled over to him. "I… would like to hear the rest of the story. Could you tell me?"

The young elf looked at her with a skeptical eye. He leaned on the hearth. "I don't know if I should. I mean, it gets kinda weird from here. Most people I tell really don't like me afterwards. In fact, they're kinda scared of me."

"I'm here to help," Ivy reminded him, "So, please, take a seat again and tell me the rest. Please?"

There was another long pause as Jing rolled this idea over in his head. Finally, he shrugged, "Fine, I don't care if you hate me, anyway. What do I have to lose?" He moved back to the couch and flopped down on it. "I couldn't sleep after that," he continued, "Every time I did, there were never sweet things like sugarplums in my dreams. Never again after that. Even now. Sometimes I don't dream at all, but when I do… it's not like the kind of dreams other elves have. Everything is dark, like all the color and light was sucked out of the world. Everything I see is spindly and twisted. Sometimes it's just objects, sometimes it's people. A few times, it's been a whole town that I dream about. Sometimes it's another town, but a couple of times, it's been Christmas Town."

"Maybe your mind is having a hard time letting go," Ivy offered.

"When are you going to tell me something that I haven't already figured out for myself?" Jing snapped at her.

Ivy pulled back slightly, "There's no need to yell," she said softly.

"Will you just let me finish without interrupting me?" Jing grumbled as he sat up, "Look, I'll just cut to the chase. This is the point I'm getting at. The weird part. Are you with me?"

"Yes," Ivy nodded, her quill ready.

"I have these dreams about these strange places and things, and I'm pretty sure that they're all from Halloween Town. They're like nothing I've ever seen before, but at the same time, they seem really familiar and I can't really decide why. But the really important part – this is the weird thing, be sure to write it down," his tone held a bitter edge of sarcasm, "The weird thing is… When I wake up from these dreams… I'm sad."

Ivy blinked once sharply, expecting something far grander than this. "Well, now, that's not odd at all," she assured Jing in a kind tone, "It's normal to feel sad after a frightening or depressing dream."

"No, no, no, no, no," Jing shook his head, "See, I'm sad… because I don't want to wake up." Ivy blinked at him again, not understanding. "I want to stay in the dream," Jing added, watching her face for any kind of reaction. He got none. "I want to stay in that dark world where everything is strange and twisted."

"You what?" Ivy sputtered, blinking like an owl.

"I," Jing leaned toward her, speaking very slowly so as to be understood, "Like. The. Dreams."

"C-come again?" Ivy lifted her brows, trying to wrap her mind around the concept of someone actually liking their nightmares.

"For the love of– Is it really that hard to understand me?" He rose from the couch, never letting his eyes leave her as he moved in backward steps toward the fireplace, "I think that when the skeleton touched my head, he did something to me. I think he gave me the images that I dream about." His eyes sparked, the fires of his soul dancing, "He left a part of his world behind with me, and that part wants to go back home. I want to find Halloween Town. More than anything else in this world, I want to find that amazing place, with its dark colors and bizarre people. I want to find it and I want to live there among them, as one of them. It's where I belong."

"Wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait!" Ivy got out of her chair and paced the room in a frenzy as she tried to understand why anyone would say such ridiculous things, "Go to Halloween Town? An elf? But that, that's… that's ludicrous! It's absurd!"

"Some help you are." Jing muttered as he crossed his arms.

Doctor Ivy Tinsel did not seem to hear him as she continued, "I mean, why? Why would anyone want to go to such a dismal place? Jing, you have so much to live for, why would you throw it all away like that? What about your future? What about Christmas Town?"

A simple three word reply brought the very fabric of Ivy's world crashing down around her like glass ornaments.

"I _hate_ Christmas."

Ivy's eyes grew wide as saucers, her delicate mouth falling agape. She seemed to want to speak, and yet only made a bit of a choked sound from the back of her throat. She stood frozen like this for a time, and Jing started to shift uneasily under such an odd gaze. Just as he was about to say that maybe he should leave, Doctor Tinsel's eyes rolled back into her head and she swooned, finally landing in a tiny heap on the floor.

"Doctor?" Jing asked after a moment, taking a cautious step toward her. There was no answer. "Doctor?" Still nothing. Jing glanced about the room, "Alright, then…" he said very slowly as he backed toward the door, "I'll, uh…. I'll just... let myself out, then. Thanks for your time."

Story © Gina Trujillo, 2006. Do NOT Copy, Alter or Distribute.

The Nightmare Before Christmas © Tim Burton/Disney


End file.
